A new study has been able to establish that adding more sugar to a foodstuff likely augments the risk of high blood pressure.

Researchers examined statistics for 4,528 adults who had no history of hypertension, taking part in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey of 2003-6.

Those who consumed no less than 2.6 ounces a day of fructose in the form of table sugar or high-fructose corn syrup were seen to have approximately twice the risk for systolic blood pressure higher than 160.

That is the apex number of the two, which is a measure of blood pressure while the heart is beating; it should usually be120 or less.

"Systolic pressure is actually what physicians desire to obtain more knowledge about, because it's related to results, and the swell is pretty striking", said Dr. Michel Chonchol, an Associate Professor of Medicine at University of Colorado Denver Health Sciences Center and the Senior Author of the paper, which appeared in The Journal of the American Society of Nephrology.

But Dr. Chonchol gave a word of caution stating that more research was desirable to establish that added fructose played a fundamental role in hypertension.

He said that this needs to be confirmed with the subsequent step, which is a randomized controlled experiment.